Operative Tied to Cuomo Is Accused of Bribing Judge to Get Favorable Rulings

A political operative with ties to Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo is expected to be charged on Thursday in connection with a bribery scheme that involved a State Supreme Court justice in Buffalo, who has already pleaded guilty in the case.

The operative, G. Steven Pigeon, is accused in a criminal complaint of bribing the justice, John A. Michalek, with help for a promotion; favors for two close relatives; Buffalo Sabres hockey tickets; and a seat at one of Mr. Cuomo’s fund-raisers. In return, the complaint says, Mr. Pigeon received favorable treatment in court cases in which he and his acquaintances had an interest.

Mr. Michalek, who had served as a justice since 1995, pleaded guilty in State Supreme Court on Wednesday to a felony count of receiving a bribe. He also admitted to filing a public document with false information, also a felony.

The case stemmed from a joint state and federal investigation led by the state attorney general, Eric T. Schneiderman, into Mr. Pigeon’s fund-raising activities.

As part of his plea agreement, Mr. Michalek, who resigned from the bench, has agreed to cooperate with the investigation. Mr. Pigeon is expected to appear in court on Thursday on unspecified charges, according to Matt Mittenthal, a spokesman for Mr. Schneiderman.

According to the complaint, Mr. Michalek repeatedly asked for Mr. Pigeon’s assistance in moving up to the Appellate Division of the court, where there was a vacancy for an associate judgeship.

“Normally I wouldn’t mention it to you,” the justice wrote in an email to Mr. Pigeon in December 2012, beginning what the complaint said was a quest for the appointment that lasted two and a half years. “Wonder if you could help.”

Mr. Pigeon apparently went straight to the top.

“Unc Steve... How’d you do with the Gov????” Mr. Michalek wrote to Mr. Pigeon on Jan. 8, 2013.

Public schedules for Mr. Cuomo, a Democrat, on and around that date, when he was preparing for his annual State of the State address, do not show Mr. Pigeon’s name. But the schedules do not always cover every detail of the governor’s day.

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G. Steven Pigeon is expected to be charged on Thursday in connection with a bribery scheme that involved a State Supreme Court justice in Buffalo.CreditMike Groll/Associated Press

If the meeting did occur, nothing seemed to come of it. “Haven’t heard a peep about the Appp Div,” Mr. Michalek wrote to Mr. Pigeon the next month.

John Kelly, a spokesman for the governor, said: “Appointees for any state appellate court must first be reviewed and approved by the judicial screening committee. Mr. Michalek’s name was never advanced by the committee to the governor for consideration for any appointment.”

Mr. Pigeon and various political action committees with which he was involved were the subject of multiple inquiries into possible campaign finance improprieties in 2008. The next year, he and his sometime boss, the Rochester billionaire Tom Golisano, brokered a Republican coup in the State Senate that threw the Capitol into disarray for a month.

Yet Mr. Pigeon, a former chairman of the Erie County Democratic organization, later re-emerged as a key contact in Western New York for Mr. Cuomo’s office as he worked to gather local support during the governor’s 2014 re-election campaign.

Mr. Pigeon’s lawyer, Paul Cambria, declined to comment on Wednesday.

If Mr. Michalek never managed to rise to the Appellate Division, his relatives prospered under Mr. Pigeon’s guidance, according to the complaint. Mr. Pigeon found a contact to help one of those relatives get a job on a political campaign. Mr. Michalek and Mr. Pigeon also repeatedly discussed different options for a second relative, including appointments to a government task force or an education committee.

Through Mr. Pigeon, the relative also got a $1,000 seat at a fund-raiser in November 2013 for Mr. Cuomo’s re-election campaign.

“We will continue to root out public corruption wherever we find it,” Mr. Schneiderman said.

The arrangement had benefits for Mr. Pigeon, too. The emails about job prospects were often interspersed with discussions about several lawsuits that companies he was consulting for had pending before the justice, who was handling commercial civil cases in Erie County Supreme Court.

Mr. Pigeon was receiving money from a party to one of the lawsuits, while his colleagues or acquaintances had a financial stake in others.

Mr. Michalek often emailed updates on the lawsuits to Mr. Pigeon, who replied with his own input; gave Mr. Pigeon advice about the direction of the cases; and handed down rulings that benefited Mr. Pigeon, his clients and his business associates, according to the complaint. In one instance, Mr. Pigeon argued that the justice should deny a motion for a protective order against a subpoena. He complied.

In May 2012, when Mr. Michalek was looking for a lawyer to handle a receivership, he took Mr. Pigeon’s recommendation of a local lawyer whom Mr. Pigeon referred to as “my guy.”

The lawyer did not appear on the court’s list of qualified receivers, but Mr. Michalek cleared that hurdle by signing a special form that said he had “required the expertise” of Mr. Pigeon’s pick.

“Have to give them a spec reason etc,” Mr. Michalek wrote to Mr. Pigeon. “Will figure it out.”

A version of this article appears in print on , on Page A22 of the New York edition with the headline: Operative Tied to Cuomo Is Accused of Bribing Judge to Get Favorable Rulings. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe